


Nicotine Patches

by baph0meat



Category: Mystic Messenger (Video Game)
Genre: F/F, Female Reader, First Kiss, Fluff, not really a blank slate self-insert reader tbh..., you can seem pretty rough around the edges in jaehee's route
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-02
Updated: 2016-09-02
Packaged: 2018-08-12 13:23:41
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,175
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7936363
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/baph0meat/pseuds/baph0meat
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The first time you saw a picture of Jaehee Kang you threw your phone across the room.</p><p>--</p><p>In which our reader is very gay and very impatient</p>
            </blockquote>





	Nicotine Patches

The first time you saw a picture of Jaehee Kang you threw your phone across the room.

In your defense, you were already overwhelmed and overstimulated, trying to keep up as five strangers all hollered into your phone while you sat in what you didn’t yet know was a dead girl’s apartment. You always hated group chats. For one to be unsolicited, you soon discovered, was the only way to make the already anxiety-inducing concept even  _ worse. _

So yeah. You threw your phone. Big deal. And maybe you barely even noticed the spiderweb of cracks that created in the upper right corner when you finally picked it up off the floor, and maybe you only took the briefest of moments to be flattered when they asked if it was a picture of you, and maybe it took you forever to finally respond after that because you kept swiping down against the tide of messages, trying to keep the image on your screen. And even then, you didn’t know how well and truly fucked you were.

It’s been five days since then, and you’re finally starting to develop a better grasp on exactly how fucked you are. She’s started calling you - it was once a day, but tonight she’s called you twice - and you’ve even been gritting your teeth and pretending you can stand Zen for her sake. (You can’t. But every time you compliment him it’s almost like you can  _ see  _ her approval, wafting up from your screen in a little burst of golden light.) In the group chat, you stick up for her, and she always openly appreciates it - but it’s when you text each other that the veneer of formality drops a little, and sometimes she says things tender enough to fill you with traitorous hope. You’re trying so hard not to read too far into it, not to  _ mess this up _ when she’s the first real friend you’ve made in a while, but there’s no way to beat back the swell in your chest every time she says things like  _ I can only tell you,  _ or  _ I knew you’d understand.  _ An inbox with only two colors in it, and without the hectic hustle and bustle of the main chat, it feels like the two of you are whispering back and forth.

She’s offline now, though - Zen’s hurt his foot, and you couldn’t think of a way to offer to go check on him without everyone taking it the wrong way, so you reluctantly suggested that she look after him instead, and (with some convincing) she ended up taking you up on it. “Jaehee Kang has left the chatroom” has become your least favorite sentence, and you find yourself staring at it glumly - as though you can make it bring her back, if you just express your dissatisfaction intently enough. It’s not working.

The apartment is huge and lonely, and it doesn’t feel like home. Of course it couldn’t, when you’ve only just started living in it, and on such short notice - but usually you live sprawled and hectic, and the place would feel more homey that way, but you can’t bring yourself to make a mess. Even with everyone but Yoosung tactfully avoiding the subject, it still feels like Rika lives here. Only the desk has any traces of you. Ramen cups empty but for yellow grease-slick, an ashtray you brought over from your old place but can’t find the courage to use, some crumpled receipts from the convenience store. You’re going to clean it all up before you turn in anyway, and sleep on the couch instead of her bed, and wake up the next morning still confused about where you are.

You’re jolted out of that train of thought by a text notification, and you don’t have the decency to be embarrassed by the urgency with which you pounce on your phone. It’s Jaehee, letting you know that she’s leaving the house - and then, at the end of the message, “I wish you could walk with me.”

It’s enough to make you slouch back in your chair and press your phone embarrassingly to your forehead. Your voice escapes your lips in a tea-kettle shriek, loud and echoing in the minimalist box of a living room, but once it's out you're able to collect yourself a bit. You tap about and delete a few different replies - “Me too,” “Be safe!,” “Maybe someday,” “Just come over here instead” - but they're all somehow both too risky and nowhere close to what you really want to say. 

Before you realize what you’ve done, you're listening to the line ring, Jaehee’s cute profile picture front and center on your phone screen. You’d called her without thinking. She picks up almost immediately, and for once you wish she hadn't, because an extra second to collect yourself would have been really useful - but really, why would anything this week go right?

“Oh, hello. I just sent you a text message, on the R.F.A. app. Did you get it?” Her voice is so soft. She sounds tired, but happy - you think, absently, that that's what she always sounds like. You've only heard her over the phone, and you wonder if she sounds this way because she's talking to you. It feels like a silly, self-important thing to think, so you push the idea away.

“Yeah, I -” You fumble, like you always do, and she waits patiently, like she always does. “I just, uh. I wanted to call instead. I wanted to hear your voice.”

It’s something you only have the courage to say because she’s said it to you before. A couple times, now, but each time you feel like you’re going to burst out of your skin.

“You're so kind. It’s nice to hear your voice, too.” Warm, a bit rough with exhaustion. Jaehee always sounds like she's thinking a little of something else. With everything on her plate, she probably is. “Have you had dinner yet?”

A guilty glance at the ramen cups on your desk. “Yeah, I did.”

“That's good.” It’s said with a sigh of relief. “I forgot to have anything… I hope Zen has something at his house, though I’d feel bad eating his food.” You can hear the rush of air past her receiver, and sometimes her quiet breaths. “Oh… I just passed a hotteok stand that’s open late. It smells so good. I think if you were here with me, I would have been tempted to stop and have some with you.”

She likes sweets. You pull on a fistful of hair and all but stuff it into your mouth to stop yourself from screaming into her ear. A moment later you manage to say, “You should stop anyway. At least for a snack…”

“I really can't. It’s already late, and I have to get to Zen so I can look after him.” Jaehee pauses, then laughs, soft and breathy. “But that's such a nice thought. I’ll imagine we’re eating them together, right now.”

Your shoes are on, unlaced and loose. You hold the phone between your shoulder and cheek as you hastily pull your unruly hair back into a ponytail. “Will you tell me what you see? As you're walking? Then it’ll … you know… sort of feel like I’m there. Is that dumb?” 

Zen’s address is public, and you know it's not that far from Rika’s apartment. “No,” Jaehee chuckles, in a tone that you're letting yourself believe is fond, “it’s not dumb. That's a little charming of you. I didn't know you had a cute side,” - and then when she says, “after the hotteok stand, there’s a restaurant with string lights all across the patio, and it looks very pretty,” your mental map clicks and you know exactly where she is. 

“I know that place,” you say, fumbling with your keys to lock the door - you’ve forgotten your jacket on the back of the desk chair, but you don't care - “but I’ve never been there. I wanna go.”

“Maybe we could go together, someday.”

You try to keep your voice steady as you take the stairs two at a time. “I’d really like that. There's some other places, too, that I wanna show you - do you like jajangmyeon? It's not fancy, but I’ve got a place I really like to go, and their jajangmyeon is the best.”

“That sounds nice.” You wonder if she's tilting her head into the phone, the way you always do, as if you could get closer to her voice. A car honks in the background, and you find yourself hoping she's watching where she’s going. “We can go after the party, to celebrate its success.”

“Yeah.” You swing around a corner as hard as you can, nearly trip over your untied shoelaces, catch yourself on a lamppost and barrel onwards. “And then again after that. And again.”

“Are you okay?” Jaehee sounds like she's stopped walking. “You sound winded.”

“I’m just excited.” It hits you, suddenly, as the hotteok stand flashes past you in a brief blur of color and sound - What are you doing? Why are you doing this? “I’m excited thinking about it.”

“You shouldn't be so excited that you're out of breath,” she chides you. “Meals with me… they would probably be a little dull, unfortunately.”

You shake your head vigorously before realizing she can’t see you. “No way. I love talking about food with you. I love when you get excited about stuff. I -”

You can see her. She looks so short, compared to how you imagined her - she's huge in your mind, dazzling, head and shoulders above everyone else. But right now, stopped on the sidewalk a block away, she looks small, and a little lonely, and like you could scoop her up in one arm. You pull your phone away from your face. “Jaehee!”

She startles, looking down at her phone quizzically - then she turns, all wide honeyed eyes, a curious hand poised at her chest, and you’re running full tilt at her and your hair is stinging your face as your ponytail whips back and forth and she’s closer and closer and closer -

“Jaehee!” You stammer it out as you nearly crash into her, and her hands go up - not to shield herself from the collision, but in wonderment, to touch you, to confirm that you're solid. The run has caught up to you, and you realize, horribly, that you must be panting and red-faced and covered in sweat. Neither of you have hung up on the call, your phones a little buzzing feedback loop in your hands.

Her eyes are so big. In photos she always looks focused, intent, sometimes exhausted, but you've never seen her look dazzled like this. “You’re tall,” she says, finally; and then, as if only now realizing, “What are you doing here?”

“I -” The options of what you could say spring up in your mind, clear and immediately unappealing: “I want to see Zen, too,” or “Girls shouldn't walk alone at night,” or something equally dumb and equally off base and equally too far away from the truth, the truth, the fact that you like girls, that you like  _ her,  _ and you couldn't wait any longer, and you're scared that already, already, already, this might be love.

So instead, you say, “You haven't eaten dinner,” and you shove your hands in your pockets and lean forward, and her eyes flutter closed so you kiss her, and you hope she's not too grossed out by the fact that you must taste like cigarettes and shitty ramen - and maybe she's not, because her wrists cross behind your neck, your profile picture still on her phone, signaling a silent phone call. She tastes like coffee.

When she pulls away, you can't look at her, so you look down at your sneakers instead. You hope your slouched shoulders and hidden hands seem casual. “Uh -”

“We shouldn't have done that,” she says, and your stomach twists and contracts in cold, brutal panic, but then she continues, “out here on the street -”

And you look up to find her covering her face, bright red from chin to forehead, her huge brown eyes peeking out between quivering fingers. She's so cute. You like her so much. You shrug and lean forward again, only barely trying to fight the smile blooming across your face. “Sorry.”

She turns her head to face you, indignant, but then her hands are planted on each side of your face. She kisses you once, firm and tight-lipped, then again, and pulls away to look you seriously in the eye.

“You should quit smoking,” she says sternly. “It’s bad for you.”

And you laugh, and you take her bags for her, and you make no promises. And before the two of you head off, you convince her to go back for hatteok - with a promise of getting some extra to bring to Zen - so that when you steal another kiss at his door, it tastes like cinnamon, and brown sugar, and nothing else.

**Author's Note:**

> oh man... this is my first fanfic that isn't jojo's bizarre adventure, ahaha.
> 
> i've fallen for this game so hard and so fast. the fact that it's the first otome i've seen with a sensitively written f/f route is no small part of that. suddenly i feel like i'm experiencing an otome the way you're actually supposed to - flustered and excited and absolutely 100% imagining myself as the protag. (is it obvious? haha)
> 
> i also love how much personality your mc can have - all of my text conversations with jaehee are me being a bad influence on her and threatening to beat up anyone who bothers her, haha. i feel like other games haven't really let me do that - at least not without losing serious points with whoever i'm talking to.
> 
> anyway, this is getting long! i'm only on day 7 of jaehee's route, so please try not to spoil me if you leave a comment, haha ;;; but, as always, every comment and kudo means the world to me.
> 
> i have a feeling this definitely isn't going to be the last time i write jaehee........!!


End file.
